Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — A Murray man charged in two separate cases involving sex crimes against children is facing even more charges after police reviewed his cellphone.
Shane Craig Smith, 25, who was already in the Utah County Jail, was arrested Tuesday for investigation of an additional 20 counts of sexual exploitation of a minor.
Smith was charged in April 2019 in 3rd District Court with five counts of unlawful sexual activity with a minor and five counts of dealing in harmful materials to a minor, all third-degree felonies.
In that case, Smith is accused of using the apps Whisper and Snapchat to meet a 14-year-old girl in 2018 and engaging in sexual activity with her, according to charging documents. A pre-trial conference in that case was scheduled for June 15.
In November, while Smith was out of jail awaiting trial in that case, he was arrested again and later charged in 4th District Court with attempted rape of a child, attempted sodomy of a child, enticing a minor, attempted sexual exploitation of a minor, and attempted child kidnapping.
In that case, Smith allegedly engaged in an online conversation with a person he belied was a 13-year-old girl but was actually an undercover officer. Smith told the “girl” he would pay her to perform sex acts and take a trip with him to San Diego, according to charging documents.
Now, investigators say they have gone through Smith’s cellphone that was seized during his November arrest and have discovered “more than 20 images of young female children between the ages of 4 years old to 12 years old,” a police affidavit states.
The images were of child pornography, the affidavit states.
